Agile Portugal - Liberating Structures - An Antidote to Zombie Scrum

Scrum is HUGE! It’s massively adopted by organizations. That’s of course awesome! Except for the fact that many organizations and teams think they’re doing Scrum, while they’re not. Sure, they’ve got all the Scrum roles, events and artifacts in place. But there’s no working software at the end of the Sprint. There’s no drive to improve. No involvement of customers and users during development. This might look like Scrum from the surface. But it isn’t. This is Zombie-Scrum, and we need to stop it!

During the presentation, you’ll learn more about the causes and symptoms of Zombie-Scrum. Even more important, you’ll discover an antidote: Liberating Structures. Please note: this presentation isn’t for the faint of heart. Be brave. Join the resistance and help us fight Zombie-Scrum!

Transcript

1. Liberating Structures
   An Antidote to Zombie Scrum
   Agile Portugal, Porto
   May 31, 2019
   

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2. Awesome Energizer!
   

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3. A Word of Warning...
   Chances are, you will be...
   ● Overwhelmed → by learning a new language
   ● Shocked → by the state of Scrum
   ● Confused → a presentation about Liberating Structures?
   ● Annoyed → 1 minute conversations?!
   ● Terrified → Scrum Zombies in the room?
   ● Even more confused → Liberating Strategy?
   ● Completely lost → Strategy Knotworking?!
   

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4. Purpose Presentation
   ● Create awareness
   ● Offer inspiration for experimentation
   ● Trigger useful conversations
   

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5. The State of Scrum(.org)
   Scrum is HUGE! It’s massively adopted by organizations!
   Some numbers:
   ● 256 Professional Scrum Trainers worldwide
   ● 143.000 people trained around the world
   ● 3.250.000 people have taken the open assessments
   ● 300.000 people are certified
   ● 100+ Scrum books
   ● 10.000.000+ Scrum articles
   

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6. The Real State of Scrum
   Many organizations think they’re doing Scrum…
   But it’s not Scrum…
   It’s...
   

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7. Zombie Scrum!
   

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8. Zombie Scrum check
   

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9. Meet the Zombie Scrum Research Team
   Barry Overeem
   -
   Doctor Stubble
   Christiaan Verwijs
   -
   Captain Curly
   Johannes Schartau
   -
   Lord Red Beard
   

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10. Cause of Zombie Scrum
    ● Complex organizational structures
    ● Plan → build → test → run
    ● “Business” and “IT”
    ● Cherry picking Scrum
    ● Tools, tools, tools
    ● Maturity models...
    ● “Agile” Contracts
    

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11. This isn’t cause #1…
    What do you think is the #1
    cause?
    

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12. Zombie Scrum Cause #1
    People often don't have a clue
    WHY they are using Scrum
    

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13. We use Scrum because...
    

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14. The Million Dollar Question
    How to prevent or fix this
    #1 cause of Zombie Scrum?
    

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15. The Silver Bullet Answer
    Transform the whole process of
    strategy-making for implementing Scrum by
    using Liberating Structures
    

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16. Liberating Structures?
    Say what?
    

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17. Liberating Structures are...
    “A language for interaction in groups”
    - Christiaan Verwijs
    

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18. Why Liberating Structures?
    Because the way we interact
    in groups is broken!
    

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19. Too structured and inhibiting
    

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20. Go Wild!
    

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21. Recognize your Scrum Events?
    

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22. Liberating Structures to the rescue
    

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23. Some Examples...
    

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24. How We Have Used It
    Individual coaching
    Team coaching
    Growing communities
    Public meetups
    Growing The Liberators
    Scrum.org classes
    Team kickoffs
    Team reboots
    Scrum events
    Family life
    Scrum Master
    Learning Journey
    

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25. Most important, we’ve used it for...
    Tackling Zombie Scrum cause #1
    

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26. How?
    Strategy Knotworking
    A collection of Liberating Structures
    

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27. Strategy Knotworking
    “An approach for shaping the future while
    creatively adapting in the moment.”
    - Keith McCandless & Johannes Schartau
    

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28. The 6 Questions
    

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29. How to Answer These Questions?
    Purpose
    Context
    Challenge
    Baseline
    Ambition
    Action &
    Evaluation
    

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30. The Key Success Factor...
    Involve the entire organization!
    

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31. “Shaping answers together builds ownership, trust, and
    momentum for action. It creates a story that is authored,
    owned and operated by everyone.”
    - Keith McCandless & Johannes Schartau
    

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32. Liberating Structures are about scaling.
    Scaling conversations.
    

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33. The result...
    By using Strategy Knotworking organizations…
    ● Started doing Scrum
    ● Continued doing Scrum
    ● Stopped doing Scrum
    Bottom line: less Zombie Scrum!
    Some examples are...
    

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34. “Awesome!
    But I still don’t know what
    Liberating Structures are...”
    

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35. Join the Zombie Scrum resistance!
    

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36. Join a Liberating Structures User Group
    

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37. Join a Strategy Knotworking Workshop
    

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38. Download the free app
    

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39. A bit of reflection
    

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40. Something new I’ve learned is...
    

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41. Something I already knew,
    but got confirmed is...
    

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42. A question that emerges is...
    

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43. A good, yet brave next step for
    me is...
    

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44. Obrigado!
    Força
    Portugal!
    

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45. ‘Unleashing Organisational Superpowers’
    As The Liberators, we take a radical approach to organizational change. Rather than taking the lead,
    we empower people within organizations to drive change themselves. As facilitators we create
    space where people can tackle difficult challenges together while also having fun. Inspired by the
    fields of complexity science and organizational psychology, we use Scrum and Liberating Structures
    to deliver fast-paced interactions, high involvement and creative destruction.
    With a strong focus on radical transparency, an experiential approach and creating a shared
    purpose, we put organizations in a position to thrive on complexity rather than being defeated by it.
    Are you ready to leave your comfort zone and unleash your superpowers?
    

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46. Unleashing Organisational Superpowers
    

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